


Black and Green

by johnny cade (johnnycake)



Series: Switchblades and Leather [28]
Category: The Outsiders (1983), The Outsiders - S. E. Hinton
Genre: Abuse, Gen, It's a little graphic, Physical Abuse, also ponyboy and johnny are just friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-07-08
Packaged: 2019-06-07 02:06:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15208472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/johnnycake/pseuds/johnny%20cade
Summary: Ponyboy comes over to Johnny's house, but as usual nothing goes as planned





	Black and Green

**Author's Note:**

> in the book there’s this one line where ponyboy talks about witnessing johnny getting hit with a two-by-four and him not crying, so *polishing angst crown* of course i had to write it.

It was very rare that anyone got – or even wanted – to go over to Johnny Cade’s house. There were lots of reasons for this, but the main one was Johnny didn’t like having people over because of his parents. They were violent people. Everyone in the gang knew it. They saw the bruises Johnny left home with. The Curtises had let him stay over more than once, afraid of what would happen to him if he went home. However, at the same time, there were also times that each one of the gang had come over. It was always when Johnny’s parents were out of the house and it was never for long. No one knew when they’d be coming back.

Which was why Ponyboy was surprised when Johnny invited him over one lazy afternoon during the summer when he was thirteen and Johnny was fifteen. It wasn’t entirely surprising considering Ponyboy’s parents were having an adult party at their house, Johnny’s parents were out grocery shopping at the moment, and it was almost one-hundred degrees out, far too hot to be hanging out outside. So they went to Johnny’s house.

Johnny’s house was just down the street from the Curtises place and the outside had always looking foreboding to Ponyboy. He wasn’t sure if that was because he knew what went on inside the house itself or because it actually had a sinister look. It was painted a dark brown and the trimmings were white. There was hardly any grass on the front lawn and the front porch was covered in old and unused plastic lawn chairs. They were covered in a thin layer of dirt and Ponyboy wondered when the last time they’d _been_ used was.

Even Johnny hesitated at the bottom of the steps that led up to the porch. Ponyboy watched him swallowed hard, staring at the house’s facade with fearful eyes before he said, “C’mon. They’re not home. It’s too hot to be out here anyway.”

It sounded like he was trying to convince himself of this more than anyone else.

Ponyboy wasn’t sure if he should be nervous or not. His eyes flicked to Johnny’s hands. They were clenched into fists. He knew that was to keep them from shaking. Cigarettes helped too, but they were out of those and it was far too hot to walk even to the corner store.

They crept into the house like robbers, opening the door as quietly as possible, Johnny looking around the room before he walked in, motioning for Ponyboy to follow. The plan was to sit in Johnny’s room until his parents came home. Then they’d go over to Steve’s or maybe Two-Bit’s or maybe even back to Ponyboy’s place. The only thing they knew for certain is they didn’t want to be here once Johnny’s parents got back.

The curtains were drawn in the living room and the kitchen, making everything dark and casting shadows in all of the corners. They were always like that. Johnny had never told any of them why, but Ponyboy suspected it was because his mother didn’t want anyone seeing what went on inside the house by accident. How many times had Johnny run out of the house, his mother chasing him with a broom or just her fists? How many times had she beaten him right here in this living room? How many times would everyone have been able to see it if the curtains weren’t covering the windows?

The living room was much cleaner than Ponyboy had thought it would be, but the kitchen was a mess. There were dishes in the sink, covered in what looked like dirt with flies buzzing around them, alighting on the rotten food still clinging to the porcelain plates. Ponyboy tried not to grimace at them for Johnny’s sake. It wasn’t his fault his parents didn’t know how to keep the house clean.

They walked on tiptoe as though one or both of Johnny’s parents were still in the house with them. There was a large shelf, full of breakable objects in the hallway that led to Johnny’s room. Ponyboy stopped, looking at the shelves. There small angels, children playing together, and other similarly cheerful figures. It surprised Ponyboy to see this shelf. He couldn’t picture Johnny’s mother collecting them and yet that had to be who they belonged to. Johnny’s father was even less likely to collect these than Johnny’s mother and Johnny himself was rarely bought anything by his parents, let alone an entire set of shelves full of breakable and probably expensive objects.

He was turning away from them, following Johnny down the hall, when his shoulder hit the corner of the shelf. The entire thing wobbled. It didn’t fall over, but several of the figures on it did. A few of them fell to the floor, shattering into a million pieces as they did.

Ponyboy staggered back, staring at the shelf in shock. He heard Johnny gasp beside him and turned to see him with his hand over his mouth, his eyes wide. He pulled his hand away from his mouth slowly and Ponyboy could see it shaking as he lowered it. He was opening his mouth to say something when they both heard a noise in one of the rooms behind them. Johnny’s head whipped around, fear on his face as he cursed under his breath. And Johnny never cursed.

“He’s still home,” Johnny said, his voice soft as he rushed back the way they’d come. “I thought he was gone, but he’s not.” Ponyboy followed him, rushing back down the hall towards the living room, but they only got to the kitchen before a loud angry voice shouted behind them.

“John Andrew Cade, you listen to me when I’m talking to you!”

Ponyboy had never heard Johnny’s father speak before and that surprised him. Somehow he’d gone all this time, being his friend and never even seen Johnny’s father, but when he looked back down the hall now he saw him. He was a largely overweight man with a clear beer belly. The back of his head was balding. He had dark hair like Johnny and dark eyes. His skin was dark too, but he looked vicious rather than sweet and kind like his son.

Johnny froze, rooted to the spot at his father’s words. Ponyboy tried tugging him out the door, but Johnny was being controlled by some stronger force now, a force no one could release him from. He stood, stiff, his entire body shaking, his eyes wide, as his father stormed down the hall towards them. Ponyboy took several steps back as the man approached them.

“Which one of you did that?” he shouted, pointing towards the broken figures on the floor.

Ponyboy opened his mouth, but Johnny turned to the man and, before Ponyboy could get out a word, said, “I did. It was me.”

For a moment, the room was silent. No one spoke. The tension hung in the air so thick that Ponyboy felt if he took a step forward, it would snap like a rubber band. But something else snapped it and Ponyboy would never be sure what, but suddenly Johnny’s father grabbed him by the arm and started dragging him towards the door that led to the backyard in the kitchen. Johnny struggled the whole way, not making a sound, but grimacing as he twisted in his father’s grip.

“You stupid piece of shit!” his father was shouting as he threw open the door and pulled him into the backyard. Ponyboy followed, a feeling of dread filling him as he did so. “You can’t do anything right! You know your mother loves those figures! You’re so fucking selfish!”

His father threw him against a stump in the backyard. Johnny grimaced, but he made no sound and somehow that was worse. It was even worse when his father picked up a two-by-four, lying in one corner of the backyard and Johnny did nothing except start shaking. Ponyboy stood in the doorway to the kitchen, frozen, unable to move, knowing nothing he could do would stop any of this.

His father forced him onto his stomach and then hit him with the two-by-four. But that wasn’t the worst part. The worst part was how Johnny made no sound at all. He just took it with a grimace on his face. His father didn’t stop until he was exhausted, until he threw down the two-by-four and staggered back, breathing heavily. Then he turned to Ponyboy and pointed at him viciously saying, “Breathe a word of this and I’ll kill you both.”

He rushed back inside, Ponyboy moving quickly out of the way so he wasn’t barreled over, before he rushed over to Johnny, who was now slumped against the stump, shaking hard. He was gasping for air and he seemed to be on the verge of tears. The fact they never fell made Ponyboy’s heart clench ever harder. He wanted him to cry, to acknowledge this was wrong and shouldn’t happen, but he didn’t and that was much worse.

Ponyboy helped him up. They went around the house rather than going back through it and headed down the street towards Ponyboy’s house.

Johnny limped the whole way, but he never made a sound and Ponyboy wished, not for the first time that he could take him away from here, that one of them could take him away from here. Out of all of them, Johnny deserved to be hurt the least and all of them wanted to make sure he was never hurt again.

**Author's Note:**

> also johnny is still trans, but i am not about deadnaming and transphobia, since it rly upsets me as a trans person so we’re not doing that.


End file.
